Joseph A. Yaro · Jan Hesselberg Editors

Adaptation to Climate Change and Variability in Rural West Africa

Adaptation to Climate Change and Variabilityin Rural West Africa

Joseph A. Yaro • Jan HesselbergEditors

Adaptation to ClimateChange and Variabilityin Rural West Africa

123

EditorsJoseph A. YaroDepartment of Geography and ResourceDevelopment

University of GhanaLegonGhana

Jan HesselbergDepartment of Sociology and HumanGeography

University of OsloOsloNorway

ISBN 978-3-319-31497-6 ISBN 978-3-319-31499-0 (eBook)DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-31499-0

Library of Congress Control Number: 2016934421

© Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2016This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved by the Publisher, whether the whole or partof the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations,recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmissionor information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilarmethodology now known or hereafter developed.The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in thispublication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt fromthe relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use.The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in thisbook are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor theauthors or the editors give a warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained herein orfor any errors or omissions that may have been made.

Printed on acid-free paper

This Springer imprint is published by Springer NatureThe registered company is Springer International Publishing AG Switzerland

Contents

1 Introduction to Book . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1Joseph Awetori Yaro and Jan Hesselberg

2 What’s on the 5th IPCC Report for West Africa? . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7Jens O. Riede, Rafael Posada, Andreas H. Fink and Frank Kaspar

3 Climate Change over West Africa: Recent Trendsand Future Projections . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25Mouhamadou Bamba Sylla, Pinghouinde Michel Nikiema,Peter Gibba, Ibourahima Kebe and Nana Ama Browne Klutse

4 Seasonal Variability: Impacts, Adaptationsand the Sustainability Challenge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41Joanna Pardoe, Julia Kloos and Noël Perceval Assogba

5 An Assessment of Determinants of Adaptive Capacity to ClimateChange/Variability in the Rural Savannah of Ghana . . . . . . . . . . . 59Joseph A. Yaro, Joseph K. Teye and Simon Bawakyillenuo

6 Climate Change, Local Knowledge and Climate ChangeAdaptation in Ghana . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83Emmanuel K. Derbile, Francis X. Jarawuraand Mohammed Y. Dombo

7 Building Bonds and Breaking Bridges: Community BasedAdaptation (CBA) as a Source of Conflict in a NorthernGhanaian Landscape . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103Sebastiaan Soeters

8 Climate Change Adaptation, Education, and RuralTransformation in Northern Ghana. Moving Beyondan Agricultural Focus. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121Wolfram Laube

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9 Migration as Societal Response to Climate Changeand Land Degradation in Mali and Senegal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147Stefan Liehr, Lukas Drees and Diana Hummel

10 The Risk Frontier: Perceiving Social Transformations in Ruraland Peri-urban West Africa Through a Territorial Lens . . . . . . . . 171Karsten Schulz and Rapti Siriwardane

11 Toward Ecosystem-Based Adaptation to Climate Change in WestAfrica: The Potential Contributions of Non-governmentalOrganizations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191Kofi Akamani

12 Mapping Social Capital for Adaptation to ClimaticVariability in a Savannah Ecosystem of Ghana . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215G.A.B. Yiran

13 Conclusions: Emerging Issues and Recommendations . . . . . . . . . . 239Jan Hesselberg and Joseph A. Yaro

vi Contents

Editors and Contributors

About the Editors

Jan Hesselberg has been a professor of Human Geography at the University ofOslo since 1985. His research interest has been and is development geography. Hehas written extensively on poverty and small-scale production activities, mostly inagriculture, both in Africa and Asia, particularly in Botswana and Sri Lanka. In the1990s and early 2000s he headed a research programme on international location ofpollution intensive industries focusing on how firms in rich countries in the Northmoved dirty industries to the South. Lately, his research has concerned agricultureand poverty in Cameroon and Ghana.

Joseph A. Yaro is an associate professor of Human Geography, with a focus onRural Development. He combines a rich background in development studies andrural geography with extensive rural research experience in northern Ghana. HisResearch interest straddle the following: Sustainable rural livelihoods; Food secu-rity; Climate change adaptation- local responses and building adaptive capacity;Land tenure; Commercial Land Deals and their livelihood impacts. He edited thebook entitled ‘Rural Development in Northern Ghana’ (2013).

Contributors

Kofi Akamani is an Assistant Professor of Forest Recreation and ConservationSocial Science in the Department of Forestry at Southern Illinois University. Hereceived his Ph.D. in Natural Resources from the University of Idaho. His inter-disciplinary teaching and research agenda involves the integration of concepts fromsocial-ecological systems research, rural sociology, and common pool resourcesamong other fields with the aim of gaining a theoretical understanding ofhuman-environment interactions across multiple scales from the local to the global,and informing policies that promote human well-being and ecosystem health acrossthe rural urban continuum. He is particularly interested in understanding and

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enhancing the resilience of rural forest-dependent communities and the adaptivegovernance of forests and water resources in the face of climate change impacts andother drivers of change.

Noel Perceval Assogba is a Junior Research Assistant in the Department ofNatural Resources Management of the Faculty of Agronomy (FA) of the Universityof Parakou (UP/ Benin Republic) as well as at the Laboratory of Applied Ecology(LEA) of the Faculty of Agronomic Sciences (FSA), University of Abomey-Calavi(UAC/Benin Republic). His work is centered on Climate Change, natural resourcesmanagement and rural livelihoods. Moreover, he is having interest on the economicimpact of Forest resources conservation on rural farmers’ livelihood.

Simon Bawakyillenuo is a Human Geographer, and currently a research fellow atthe Institute of Statistical, Social and Economic Research (ISSER), University ofGhana, Legon, Ghana. He attained his Ph.D. in Human Geography and M.Sc. inEnvironmental Policy and Management from the University of Hull, UK, in 2007and 2003 respectively. His key research interests include different forms of energyand their interrelationships with health and the environment; energy policy;renewable energy dissemination and utilisation discourses; climate change; envi-ronmental policy; green economy.

Emmanuel Kanchebe Derbile is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Planningand Management, Faculty of Planning and Land Management at the University forDevelopment Studies, Ghana. He has expertise in development studies anddevelopment planning. He holds a Ph.D. in Development Studies from the Centrefor Development Research (ZEF), University of Bonn and a M.Sc. in DevelopmentPlanning and Management from the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science andTechnology/University of Dortmund.His research interest lies in the nexus betweenenvironmental change, including climate change, local knowledge systems policyplanning and livelihood sustainability in arid and semi-arid regions.

Mohammed Dombo works as a Senior Researcher at Endogenous DevelopmentService (EDS) Ghana, a multidisciplinary research and consulting service organi-zation in Ghana. He also works as a Consultant on education to Tzedek TwiningConsultant in the Northern Region Ghana. He holds an M.Sc. in DevelopmentPlanning and Management from the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science andTechnology, Ghana and a Bachelors degree in Integrated Development Studiesfrom the University for Development Studies, Ghana. His research interests centreson climate change adaptation and land use planning, migration, urbanization andsocial change.

Lukas Drees is research assistant at ISOE—Institute for Social-EcologicalResearch and works in the research unit Water Resources and Land Use. Hestudied Landscape Ecology at the University of Münster and holds a M.Sc. inEnvironmental Geography from the University of Marburg. His research focus liesin integrated modelling methods of human-nature interactions, in particularBayesian networks and agent-based models.

viii Editors and Contributors

Andreas H. Fink is a Professor specialized on tropical meteorology at the Instituteof Meteorology and Climatology of the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology(Germany). A regional research focus is the meteorology and climatology of theWest African Monsoon. He also lead or was Principal Investigator in severalmultidisciplinary research projects dealing with observations and impacts of climatevariability and change in subtropical and tropical Africa. He has publishednumerous peer-reviewed articles and book chapters on topics ranging from rainfalltrends, weather systems dynamics to malaria modeling.

Peter Gibba is currently completing his Ph.D. degree on West African ClimateSystem at the Federal University of Technology, Akure (FUTA) in Nigeria, incollaboration with the West African Science Service Center on Climate Change andAdapted Landuse (WASCAL). He is working in the field of climate change andimpacts and investigating the behaviour of extreme precipitation events underglobal warming from Global and Regional Climate Models. Prior to his Ph.D.degree programme, Mr. Gibba combined the position of Senior Meteorologist andHead of Research and Applications (R&A) Unit under The Gambia NationalMeteorological and Hydrological Services (NMHS), legally constituted as theDepartment of Water Resources (DWR).

Diana Hummel is research scientist at the research unit Biodiversity and Peopleand member of the executive board of ISOE—Institute for social-ecologicalresearch, Frankfurt/Main, Germany. She is also part of the SenckenbergBiodiversity and Climate Research Center (BiK-F). She holds a Ph.D. in politicalscience and received her habilitation in 2009 at the faculty of social sciences atGoethe University, Frankfurt. She is a lecturer for political science. Her keyresearch interests lie in population dynamics, biodiversity and social-ecologicalprovisioning systems, concepts of societal relations to nature, and gender &environment.

Francis Xavier Jarawura holds a Ph.D. in Migration Studies from the Universityof Ghana. He is an affiliate of the Centre For Migration Studies at the University ofGhana. He also works as a private consultant to several international NGOs inGhana mainly on climate change adaptation, food security and rural development.His current research interests include environmental change and adaptation,migration and rural livelihoods.

Frank Kaspar is head of Germany’s National Climate Data Center at Germany’snational meteorological service (Deutscher Wetterdienst, DWD). He has a back-ground in paleoclimatology, climate modelling and satellite-based climate moni-toring. His department contributes to national and international research activitiesrelated to climate data management and climate monitoring.

Ibourahima Kebe is currently completing his Ph.D. degree in West African cli-mate System at the Federal University of Technology, Akure (FUTA) in Nigeria.This program is in collaboration with the West African Science Service Center onClimate Change and Adapted Landuse (WASCAL). He obtained his master degree

Editors and Contributors ix

on Atmospheric and Ocean Sciences from the University of Assane Seck ofZiguinchor, Senegal. His key research interests focus on the Impact of ClimateChange on West African Monsoon Features and their relationship with Convectionand Precipitation.

Julia Kloos was trained as an agricultural economist and holds a Ph.D. degreefrom the University of Bonn, Germany. Her research interests include climatechange adaptation, conflict, risk and vulnerability, integrated water resourcesmanagement and the economics of land degradation. As Associate AcademicOfficer in the Environmental Vulnerability and Ecosystem Services (EVES)Section at United Nations University—Institute for Environment and HumanSecurity (UNU-EHS), Dr. Kloos managed various research projects dealing withclimate change adaptation of rural and urban social-ecological systems specificallyin West Africa, Egypt and Central Asia.

Nana Ama Browne Klutse is a Research Scientist and Manager of the RemoteSensing and Climate Centre at the Ghana Space Science and Technology Instituteof the Ghana Atomic Energy Commission. She holds a Ph.D. in Climatology fromthe University of Cape Town, South Africa. Her research focuses on climatemodelling and climate impact assessments on health, energy, and gender.

Wolfram Laube is a senior researcher at the Center for Development Research(ZEF), University of Bonn, Germany. He coordinates the Ghanaian-German Centerfor Development Studies at the University of Ghana and engages in research onrural transformation, agricultural commercialization, education and social mobilitywith a focus on northern Ghana.

Stefan Liehr has been a research scientist at ISOE—Institute for Social-EcologicalResearch since 2003, and he is head of the research unit Water Resources and LandUse. He is part of Southern African Science Service Centre for Climate Change andAdaptive Land Management (SASSCAL) and of Senckenberg Biodiversity andClimate Research Centre (BiK-F). After being trained as a natural scientist at theUniversities Frankfurt, Göttingen and Bremen, he received his doctorate in 2001 inthe field of modelling and analysis of non-stationary stochastic processes. His keyresearch interests lie in modeling of social-ecological systems and integratedmanagement of water and land resources.

Pinghouinde Michel Nikiema is currently a Ph.D. student in West AfricanClimate System at the Federal University of Technology, Akure, Nigeria in col-laboration with the West African Science Service Center on Climate Change andAdapted Landuse (WASCAL). He holds an M.sc. Degree in atmospheric sciencefrom Nanjing University of Information Science and Technology, China. Prior tohis Ph.D. program he worked at the National Meteorological office of Burkina Faso.His key research interests focus on climate projection uncertainties quantificationover West Africa.

x Editors and Contributors

Joanna Pardoe is a Research Officer at the Grantham Research Institute onClimate Change and the Environment at the London School of Economics whereshe works on climate change adaptation in South and Central Africa. Prior tojoining LSE, Joanna was a Ph.D. Researcher at the United Nations University—Institute for Environment and Human Security where she conducted research intoclimate change vulnerability and adaptation under the West African Science ServiceCentre for Climate Change and Adapted Land Use (WASCAL).

Rafael Posada is a postdoctoral researcher at the Climate Monitoring divisionof the Deutscher Wetterdienst (German Meteorological Service, DWD) inOffenbach, Germany. He is involved in the climate area of the Southern AfricanScience Service Centre for Climate Change and Adaptive Land Management(SASSCAL) initiative through the cooperation with National MeteorologicalServices in southern Africa on the management of historical and current climatedata.

Jens Riede is a natural scientist and postdoctoral researcher in the ClimateMonitoring division of the Deutscher Wetterdienst (German Meteorolocial Service,DWD) in Offenbach. He is also a researcher in the climate task of the SouthernAfrican Science Service Center for Climate Change and Adaptive LandManagement (SASSCAL), where he is collaborating with National Meteorologicaland Hydrological Services in the southern African region.

Karsten Schulz is a Research Fellow in the Department of Regional andEnvironmental Sciences at the University of Trier, Germany, where he works on thepolitical ecology of climate change adaptation and urban water use in West Africa.He completed his M.A. in Political Science at the University of Bonn, and his Ph.D.in Political Geography at the Center for Development Research (ZEF). Havingpreviously published on a variety of topics such as environmental politics, changingnature-society relations and sustainability transformations, he is also the author ofLinking Land and Soil to Climate Change (Tectum, 2011).

Rapti Siriwardane is a Postdoctoral Researcher with the working groupDevelopment and Knowledge Sociology at the Leibniz-Center for Tropical MarineEcology (ZMT), Germany. Trained as a social anthropologist and a culturalgeographer, she holds a M.Sc. in Nature, Society and Environmental Policy fromthe University of Oxford and a Ph.D. in Development Politics from the Center forDevelopment Research (ZEF), University of Bonn. Her previous work has appearedin Fish and Fisheries, and her latest book project Coastal and Maritime Lifeworlds(Springer, 2016) focuses on the politics of boundary-making, migration and set-tlerhood in the Indian Ocean.

Sebastiaan Soeters is post-doctoral researcher at the Utrecht University ofUtrecht, The Netherlands. He does research and coordinates a program on conflictand cooperation in the management of climate change in Ghana, Kenya andBurkina Faso, funded by DFID through the Netherlands Organisation for ScientificResearch (NWO). He engages in research on dynamics of conflict and cooperation

Editors and Contributors xi

between farmers and pastoralists evolving from adaptation interventions includingdry-season farming, irrigation schemes, soil fertility management and biodiversity.

Mouhamadou Bamba Sylla is currently the senior scientist in climate change andclimate modeling and also acts as the coordinator of the observation network at theWest African Science Service Center on Climate Change and Adapted Landuse(WASCAL) Competence Center based in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso. He holds aPh.D. in Climate Change and Impacts from the University Cheikh Anta Diop ofDakar, Senegal in collaboration with the International Centre for TheoreticalPhysics, Trieste, Italy. His key research interests focus on regional climate mod-eling towards a better understanding of anthropogenic climate change over WestAfrica, climate change impacts and adaptation.

Joseph Kofi Teye holds a Ph.D. in Geography from the University of Leeds, UKand a Master of Philosophy degree in Social Change from the NorwegianUniversity of Science and Technology, Trondheim. He is a Senior Lecturer at theDepartment of Geography and Resource Development, and the Coordinator ofPostgraduate Programmes at the Centre for Migration Studies, University of Ghana.Dr. Teye’s main areas of research include: Natural resource policy analysis, envi-ronmental change, migration and development.

Mr. Gerald A.B. Yiran is a Lecturer in the Department of Geography andResource Development, University of Ghana. He holds a Ph.D. in Geography andResource Development. Gerald’s research advances the understanding of theinteraction between man and the environment focusing on Land Use and LandCover (LULC) change studies, natural resource management, vulnerabilityassessment and related policy analyses. He combines theories and methods in bothnatural and social sciences with modern technological tools such as remote sensingand GIS. Webpage: http://www.ug.edu.gh/geog-resource/staff/gerald-b-yiran

xii Editors and Contributors

Chapter 1Introduction to Book

Joseph Awetori Yaro and Jan Hesselberg

1.1 Introduction

This book provides conceptual and empirical discussions of adaptation to climatechange/variability in rural West Africa. It brings on-board country experiences inadaptation by different socio-economic groups and efforts at building adaptivecapacity. It presents a holistic understanding of adaptation and shows contextualand generic sources of adaptive capacity. Focusing on adaptation to climatechange/variability is critical because the development challenges of rural WestAfrica have been historically intertwined with its climate. Moreover, emergingpatterns of climate change are inextricably linked to developmental issues today forWest Africa’s agrarian communities with high numbers of the population earning aliving directly and indirectly from the natural environment. Natural resourcedependence and agrarian livelihoods make such communities most vulnerable toclimate-driven ecological change. Therefore, it is imperative that rural people adaptto climate change, but their ability to successfully do so may be limited by com-peting risks and vulnerabilities. Their adaptive capacity may be impeded by sourcesof vulnerabilities such as agricultural policies, trade arrangements or governanceissues that are rooted in the wider political economy. Providing an elucidation ofthese vulnerabilities and the capacities needed to enable successful adaptation andavoid maladaptation is critical for future policy formulation. Though the empiricaldiscussions in this book are about West Africa, their applicability in terms of theprocesses, structures, needs, strategies, and recommendations for policy transcends

J.A. Yaro (&)Department of Geography and Resource Development, University of Ghana, Legon, Ghanae-mail: jayaro@ug.edu.gh

J. HesselbergDepartment of Sociology and Human Geography, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norwaye-mail: jan.hesselberg@sosgeo.uio.no

© Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2016J.A. Yaro and J. Hesselberg (eds.), Adaptation to Climate Changeand Variability in Rural West Africa, DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-31499-0_1

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West Africa and they provide useful lessons for understanding adaptation broadlyin rural settings of the developing world.

West Africa is predominantly a semiarid region with a rapidly growing popu-lation and a low gross domestic product (Ayuk and Kabore 2013; Brown et al.2009; Elbehri 2013; Jerven 2015). The rural population in the West AfricanSavannah and Sahel constitutes one of the most vulnerable on earth, and thisvulnerability is partly caused by the variability of the West African monsoon(Barbier et al. 2009). West Africa’s climate is among the most variable in the worldon intra-seasonal to decadal timescales (see Chaps. 2 and 3). There has been apattern of continued aridity since the late 1960s and some recovery since the 1990s(Christiansen et al. 2007; Codjoe and Owusu 2011; Nicholson et al. 1999). Theprojected climate change indicates continuous and stronger warming (1.5–6.5 °C)and a wider range of precipitation uncertainty (roughly between −30 and 30 %)which is even broader in the Sahel and increasing in the farther future (Sylla et al.this volume). The mean precipitation change over West Africa shows a less evidenttrend and mostly oscillates between −10 and 10 %. Sylla et al. (this volume) assertthat in the rest of West Africa the projected rainy season and the growing seasonwill become shorter while the torrid, arid and semi-arid climate conditions willsubstantially extend. Riede et al. (this volume) assert that climate projections forWest Africa show a slight increase of total precipitation and a longer rainy seasonwith a drier phase within. These differences in projections result from the unpre-dictable West African monsoon system.

The changing climate and increasing variability increases the vulnerability of theregion’s population to climate stressors such as droughts, floods, heat waves, andchanging rainfall patterns, and will increase the cost of food, health, basic infras-tructural provision and humanitarian assistance. The impacts of climate change onthe region are expected to be widespread, complex, and geographically and tem-porally variable (Marc et al. 2015; Wakhungu 2011; Yaro et al. 2010). The differentclimate stressors will reduce agricultural production in West Africa significantlyand therefore affect the livelihoods of over half of its population living in rural areas(Hallegatte et al. 2016). The changing climate does not only affect agriculture; itimpacts all facets of the lives of rural dwellers.

Rural West Africans deploy a range of ingenious strategies in dealing withclimatic changes and variability, including irrigation, change in crop varieties,non-farm activities, and diversification of crops and livestock. These strategiesreduce farmers’ dependency on rainfall but are insufficient to reduce poverty andvulnerability for the majority (Barbier et al. 2009; Rademacher-Schulz et al. 2014;Resurreccion 2013). These adaptive strategies are dependent on adaptive capacities,which are enabled by social, economic, physical, and cultural circumstances(Derbile and Laube 2014). The IPCC (2001) defines adaptive capacity as thepotential, capability, or ability of a system to adapt to climate change stimuli andtheir effects or impacts. A deeper understanding of adaptation is critical inanswering the questions: How effective are these strategies? What determines them?Which interventions are more helpful and to whom? What policies are enabling ordisabling? How can we enhance the capacity of rural Africa to adapt appropriately?

2 J.A. Yaro and J. Hesselberg

The multiplex livelihoods in dry areas mirror complex realities of life. We need tounearth the intricate processes, intentions and aspirations of rural dwellers tounderstand their adaptation potentials and reasons for failure and success. To beeffective, these measures require different structures and institutions to galvanisenecessary action and resources. Some of these measures include the following assuggested by Agrawal et al. (2008): information gathering and dissemination,resource mobilization and allocation, skills development and capacity building,providing leadership, and networking with other decision makers and institutions.

Although the main manifestations of climate change are of a physical nature,their consequences transcend ecological, social, cultural, political and economicimpacts (Afifi et al. 2014; Hallegatte et al. 2016; Inderberg et al. 2015; Mendelsohnet al. 2006; O’Brien and Selboe 2015; Rademacher-Schulz and Salifu 2014) andshape prospects for food, water and health security. Adaptation can be positive ornegative: positive if it is by choice, reversible, and increases security; negative if itis of necessity, irreversible, and fails to increase security. The challenge is to showhow the political economy and its embedded social relations impede and facilitateeffective adaptation to climate change. Building adaptive capacity requires sub-stantial attention to crucial factors such as land rights and access to resources, legalprovisions and policies, trade regimes, as well as governance issues such as elitecapture of resources which generate or maintain poverty and shape access patternsdefining livelihood resilience. The effects of climate change/variability should notlead to catastrophic and irreversible damage to humans since societies’ adaptivecapacity can be strengthened and streamlined (Heltberg et al. 2009; IPCC 2007;Leary and 2007).

1.2 Outline of the Book

Chapter 1 introduces the subject matter of the book and provides a summary of itscontents. It makes a case for dealing with adaptation to climate change/variability inrural West Africa.

In Chap. 2, an analysis of the IPPCs 5th report is presented to set the backgroundagainst which the discussions on adaptation can be related. The latest IPCC (2014)report concludes that Africa as a whole is one of the most vulnerable continents dueto its high exposure and low adaptive capacity. Temperature projections over WestAfrica from global climate simulation for the end of the 21st century range between3 and 6 °C above the late 20th century baseline depending on the emission scenario.The authors of this chapter observe that in the past a shift of the rainy season wasdiscussed, but currently a shift cannot be observed for West Africa. Yet the lengthof the Sahelian rainy season reveals an increasing trend of 2–3 days per decade,with a drier phase within. However, climate projections show a slight increase oftotal precipitation and a longer rainy season.

1 Introduction to Book 3

Similarly, Chap. 3 continues the analysis of the physical dimension of climatechange in the region. The chapter presents an assessment of recent trends and futurechanges of the climate in the region. It shows that the Sahel has recovered from theprevious drought episodes of the 1970s and 1980s. However, the precipitationamount is not at the level of the pre-drought period. The authors argue that mostcountries in West Africa will have to cope with shorter rainy seasons; generalizedtorrid, arid and semi-arid conditions; longer dry spells; and more intense extremeprecipitations.

Chapter 4 meticulously argues that the strategies for climate change adaptationdesigned for deliberate change have to be considered in the context of closelycoupled social-ecological systems. It presents examples of prominent adaptationstrategies that have been introduced in an attempt to adjust to the already evolvingclimatic conditions and shows that a lack of whole systems thinking is at the heartof the limited sustainability of promising strategies.

Chapter 5 examines the determinants of adaptive capacity in rural northernGhana. It reveals that while adaptive capacity in the northern savannah zone isgenerally low due to high levels of poverty and poor state presence, it varies spatiallydue to locational, individual and community factors. The importance of both com-munity and individual level factors and characteristics defining the capacities toadopt specific adaptation strategies to climate change threats are cogently discussed.

Chapter 6 evaluates the potential role and limitations of local knowledge in climatechange adaptation from an endogenous development perspective in Ghana. It cau-tions that even though local knowledge enables environmental sustainability andclimate change adaptation in smallholder agriculture, it is not without limits and risks.

Chapter 7 examines the concept of community-based adaptation (CBA) as a keystrategy in adaptation and rural development landscapes. It shows how CBAs canbe very successful at raising the profile of bottom-up expressions in the interna-tional climate change architecture with strong top-down, “scientistic” tendencies.Using social capital as an analytical capsule, this chapter investigates competingclaims arising in the context of a sudden increase in the value of natural resources.

Chapter 8 focuses on trajectories of rural transformation in northern Ghana byexamining changes in rural aspirations and future-oriented strategies among therural people. It discusses the extent to which these changes contribute to betterindividual social mobility, rural transformation and enhanced adaptation and con-cludes that rural adaptation policies, often focussing on agriculture, need to takechanging aspirations and larger rural social transformations into account.

Chapter 9 addresses the issue of migration as a societal response to climatechange using Mali and Senegal as cases. It shows how the changing and unsteadyenvironmental conditions lead to changing patterns of migration. It examines theinteracting influence of environmental and socio-economic conditions on thedecision to migrate, but stresses that unfavourable environmental conditions play adecisive role when people migrate seasonally for economic reasons.

Chapter 10 discusses the distinct overemphasis on rural agricultural spaces thatundergirds much of the literature on local riskscapes in West Africa. It does this byelucidating how households that live on the fringes of rapidly transforming

4 J.A. Yaro and J. Hesselberg

peri-urban spaces are caught in a double bind of institutional and spatialmarginality. The chapter argues that peri-urban households are confronted withsocio-environmental risks that are similar to those experienced by their ruralcounterparts, while at the same time being subjected to interrelated institutional andmaterial transformations which define such spaces as dynamic risk frontiers.

Chapter 11 discusses the turn toward ecosystem-based adaptation, which adoptsa multi-sectoral approach to sustaining healthy ecosystems as a means of reducingvulnerability and enhancing the resilience of social and ecological systems to cli-mate change impacts. It shows that although the concept of ecosystem-basedadaptation appears promising, the transition from conventional climate changeadaptation policies toward ecosystem-based adaptation in West Africa has beenslow. The chapter also discusses the potential roles of non-governmental organi-zations (NGOs) in enhancing awareness, generating interest, creating opportunities,and building capacities for enhancing the transition toward ecosystem-basedadaptation.

Chapter 12 employs mapping as a vital tool in using social capital for effectiveadaptation. It quantifies critical variables, which are displayed in interactive maps toshow spatial vulnerabilities and capacities.

The concluding chapter provides general recommendations for improving thelives of the rural population via the creation of macro and micro level conditionsand policies that enhance appropriate adaptation for all.

References

Afifi, T., Liwenga, E., & Kwezi, L. (2014). Rainfall-induced crop failure, food insecurity andoutmigration in same-kilimanjaro Tanzania. Climate and Development, 6(1), 53–60.

Agrawal, A., Chhatre, A., & Hardin, R. (2008). Changing governance of the world’s forests.Science, 320, 1460–1462.

Ayuk, E. T., & Kabore, S. T. (Eds.). (2013). Wealth through integration. Regional integration andpoverty-reduction strategies in West Africa. Berlin: Springer.

Barbier, B., Yacouba, H., Karambiri, H., Zoromé, M., & Somé, B. (2009). Human vulnerability toclimate variability in the sahel: Farmers’ adaptation strategies in northern burkina faso.Environmental Management, 43, 790–803.

Brown, M. E., Hintermann, B., & Higgins, N. (2009). Markets, climate change, and food securityin West Africa. Environmental Science and Technology, 43, 8016–8020.

Christiansen, J. H., Hewitson, B., Busuioc, A., Chen, A., Gao, X., Held, I., et al. (2007). Regionalclimate projections: Climate change 2007: The physical science basis. In Q. D. Solomon S.Manning M. Chen Z. Marquis M. Averyt K.B. Tignor et al. (Eds.), (pp. 847–940). Cambridge:Cambridge University Press.

Codjoe, S. N. A., & Owusu, G. (2011). Climate change/variability and food systems: Evidencefrom afram plains, Ghana. Regional Environmental Change. doi:19.1007/s10113-011-0211-3.

Derbile, E. K., & Laube, W. (2014). Local knowledge flows for reducing vulnerability of rain-fedagriculture to environmental change: Patterns and drivers of flow in north-eastern Ghana.Information and Knowledge Management, 4(7), 24–38.

Elbehri, A. (2013). Rebuilding West Africa’s food potential: Policies and market incentives forsmallholder-inclusive food value chains. Rome: FAO and IFAD.

1 Introduction to Book 5

Hallegatte, S., Bangalore, M., Bonzananigo, L., & Vogt-Schilb, A. (2016). Shock waves.Managing the impacts of climate change and poverty. Washington DC: World Bank.

Heltberg, R., Bennett, P. S., & Jorgensen, S. L. (2009). Addressing human vulnerability to climatechange: Toward a ‘no-regrets’ approach. Global Environmental Change, 19.

Inderberg, T. H., Eriksen, S., O’Brien, K., & Sygne, L. (Eds.). (2015). Climate change adaptationand development. Transforming paradigms and practices. London: Routledge.

IPCC. (2001). Climate change: Impacts, adaptation and vulnerability. In J. J. McCarthy, O.F. Canziani, N. A. Leary, D. J. Dokken & K. S. White (Eds.), A contribution of the workinggroup ii to the third assessment report of the intergovernmental panel on climate changeCambridge: Cambridge University Press.

IPCC. (2007). Climate change 2007: Summary for decision makers. Cambridge: CambridgeUniversity Press.

IPCC. (2014). Climate change 2014. Synthesis report. Summary for policy makers. Cambridge:Cambridge University Press.

Jerven, M. (2015). Africa. Why economists get it wrong. London: Zed Books.Leary, N. et al. (2007). A stitch in time: Lessons for climate change adaptation from the AIACC

project. AIACC working paper (Vol. 48). Washington, DC: AIACC.Marc, A., Verjee, N., & Mogaka, S. (2015). The challenge of stability and security in West Africa.

Washington DC: World Bank.Mendelsohn, R., Dinar, A., & Williams, L. (2006). The distributional impact of climate change on

rich and poor countries. Environment and Development Economics, 11, 159–178.doi:110.1017/S1355770X05002755.

Nicholson, S. E., Some, B., & Kone, B. (1999). An analysis of recent rainfall conditions in westAfrica, including the rainy seasons of the 1997 el nin˜o and the 1998 la nin˜a years. Journal ofClimate, 13, 2628–2640.

O’Brien, K., & Selboe, E. (Eds.). (2015). The adaptive challenge of climate change. Cambridge.Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Rademacher-Schulz, C., & Salifu, E. (2014). Where the rain falls project. Case study: Ghana.Results from nadowli district, upper west region. Report no 3. Bonn: United Nations University(UNU-EHS).

Rademacher-Schulz, C., Schraven, B., & Mahama, E. S. (2014). Time matters: Shifting seasonalmigration in Northern Ghana in response to rainfall variability and food insecurity. Climate andDevelopment, 6(1), 46–52.

Resurreccion, B. P. (2013). Persistent women and environmental linkages in climate change andsustainable development agendas. Women’s Studies International Forum, 40, 33–43.

Wakhungu, J. (2011). Achieving food security in the face of climate change: Summary for policymakers from the commission on sustainable agriculture and climate change CGIAR. ResearchProgram on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security.

Yaro, J. A., Dogbe, T. D., Bizikova, L., Bailey, P., Ahiable, G., Yahaya, T., et al. (2010). Thesocial dimensions of adaptation to climate change in Ghana. Economics of adaptation toclimate change. World Bank Discussion paper number 15. Washington DC: World Bank.

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Chapter 2What’s on the 5th IPCC Reportfor West Africa?

Jens O. Riede, Rafael Posada, Andreas H. Fink and Frank Kaspar

Abstract The status of knowledge on observed and projected climate change isregularly summarized in the assessment reports of the Intergovernmental Panel onClimate Change. The latest IPCC report (2013) concludes that Africa as a whole isone of the most vulnerable continents due to its high exposure and low adaptivecapacity. Here, the major conclusions of the report for Western Africa are sum-marized. Although there are still large gaps in the available data, evidence ofwarming over land regions across Africa, consistent with anthropogenic climatechange, has increased. Temperature projections over West Africa for the end of the21st century from global climate simulation range between 3 and 6 °C above thelate 20th century baseline depending on the emission scenario. A similar range isproduced with regional climate models that are used to downscale global climatesimulations. For some regions, unprecedented climates are projected to occur ataround 2040. Important progress has been made in the understanding of WestAfrican weather systems during the African Monsoon Multidisciplinary Analysis(AMMA; phase 1: 2002–2010, phase 2: 2010–2020) project. For many processes inecology, agriculture or hydrology, precipitation is one of the most importantparameters. In addition to the total precipitation, the onset of the rainy season is ofspecial interest for agriculture. In the past a shift of the rainy season was discussed,but currently a shift cannot be observed for West Africa. However, the length of theSahelian rainy season reveals an increasing trend of 2–3 days per decade, with adrier phase within. Since the 1950s annual precipitation has tended to decrease inwestern and eastern parts of the Sahel region, with a very dry period in the 70s and80s and a slight increase of precipitation afterwards, until today. However, climateprojections show a slight increase of total precipitation and a longer rainy seasonwith a drier phase within.

J.O. Riede (&) � R. Posada � F. KasparDeutscher Wetterdienst (DWD), Climate Monitoring, 63067 Offenbach, Germanye-mail: Jens-Olaf.Riede@dwd.de

A.H. FinkKarlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), Institute of Meteorology and Climate Research,76128 Karlsruhe, Germany

© Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2016J.A. Yaro and J. Hesselberg (eds.), Adaptation to Climate Changeand Variability in Rural West Africa, DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-31499-0_2

7

2.1 Introduction

Climate variability and climate change have impacts on many sectors, such asagriculture, water availability and health. Depending on the adaptive capacity of asociety, these impacts might result in strong vulnerability. One of the main featuresresponsible for climatic conditions over West Africa is the West African monsoonsystem (WAM). The underlying atmospheric processes and interactions with theland surface and ocean are complex and not yet fully understood. Several recentresearch activities have addressed the knowledge gap the and did advance ourunderstanding of the WAM system. Among these are the African MultidisciplinaryMonsoon Analysis (AMMA, phase 1: 2002–2010, phase 2: 2010–2020) or theGLOWA-Impetus and GLOWA-Volta project. Results of these activities have beenpublished in several special issues (Lafore et al. 2010; Plocher et al. 2011; Spethet al. 2010).

The status of knowledge on global and regional climate change and relatedimpacts has been summarized in the 5th Assessment Report (AR5) of theIntergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Widespread impacts of cli-mate change have been identified on all continents and detailed regional summariesare available.

The following sections provide a summary of these findings. Section 2.2 gives ashort introduction to the climate of West Africa. Sections 2.3 and 2.4 provide asummary of the major IPCC conclusions about observed and projected climatechange in West Africa. Readers not familiar with the work of IPCC can find somebackground information in Box 1.

Box 1. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate ChangeThe IPCC is a scientific body under the auspices of the United Nations(UN) which reviews and assesses the most recent scientific, technical andsocio-economic information produced worldwide relevant to the under-standing of climate change. This international body publishes AssessmentReports (AR) periodically to provide a clear and up to date view of thecurrent state of scientific knowledge about climate change. The IPCC iscurrently organized in 3 Working Groups and a Task Force. Working Group Ideals with “The Physical Science Basis of Climate Change”, WorkingGroup II with “Climate Change Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability” andWorking Group III with “Mitigation of Climate Change”. The Task Force onNational Greenhouse Gas Inventories is to develop and refine a methodologyfor the calculation and reporting of national greenhouse gas emissions andremovals. The preparation of the last report (Fifth Assessment Report, AR5)involved more than 830 authors and review editors from over 80 countries.They in turn drew on the work of over 1000 contributing authors and about2000 expert reviewers who provided over 140,000 review comments.

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The assessments have become much more complete over time, evolvingfrom making very simple, general statements about sectorial impacts, throughgreater concern with regions regarding observed and projected impacts andassociated vulnerabilities, to an enhanced emphasis on sustainability andequity, with a deeper examination of adaptation options (Hewitson et al.2014). The AR5 provides an assessment of regional aspects of climate changein different parts of the world. The evidence linking observed impacts onbiological, physical, and (increasingly) human systems to recent and ongoingregional climate changes has become more compelling since the AR4. Onereason for this is the improved reporting of published studies from hithertounder-represented regions of the world, especially in the tropics (Rosenzweigand Neofotis 2013).

That said, there is still a large disparity between the copious evidencebeing presented from Europe and North America, as well as good quality dataemerging from Australasia, polar regions, many ocean areas, and some partsof Asia and South America, on the one hand, and the much sparser coverageof studies from Africa, large parts of Asia, Central and South America, andmany small islands, on the other. However, as the time series ofwell-calibrated satellite observations become longer in duration, and hencestatistically more robust, these are increasingly providing a near globalcoverage of changes in surface characteristics such as vegetation, hydrology,and snow and ice conditions that can usefully complement or substitute forsurface observations (Stocker et al. 2013).

The IPCC AR5 includes an extensive chapter dedicated to Africa in whichthe observed climate trends and projections are described (Niang et al. 2014).In this section we summarize observed and projected climate trends describedin the IPCC Report, with a special focus on the Western part of the continent.

2.2 Climate Zones in West Africa

The climate in Africa has huge variation between the most northern parts in Tunisiaand the most southern parts in South Africa. Therefore a variety of climate zonesexist in Africa: from tropical rainforest climates in East, Central and West Africa toalpine climate on the East African Mountains. The term “West Africa” is commonlyused to refer to the western part of Africa, although the geographical boundaries ofthis area are not clear and differ from one source to another. For instance, Lélé andLamb (2010) considers “West Africa” as being bounded by the Atlantic Ocean tothe west and south, by the north of the Sahel-zone at around 20° N latitude to thenorth, and by 10° E to the east. Another definition of Western Africa is the eco-nomic area “Economic Community of West African States” (ECOWAS) including15 countries in Western Africa (Benin, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, Gambia, Ghana,

2 What’s on the 5th IPCC Report for West Africa? 9

Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Ivory Coast, Liberia, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, SierraLeone, Togo). This is the definition that has also been used in the latest IPCCreport. On average the region is around 300 m above sea level, with only a fewmountainous regions.

Wet and dry tropical climate zones occur in the region. Figure 2.1 shows thedistribution of annual precipitation in the region. Precipitation has a strongsouth-north-gradient: the annual amount decreases significantly from the Atlanticcoast in the south towards the Sahara in the north. The aridity increases accordinglywith the distance from the ocean. Based on these great differences in precipitation,three climatic zones exist in Western Africa (e.g., according to Njeri et al. 2006,Fink et al. 2016): (a) The Sahelian zone, with irregular annual rainfall that does notexceed 500 mm, and a maximum rainfall occurring in August. This zone is locatedroughly at 12.5° N latitude and its climate is semi-arid. (b) The Sudanian zone witha precipitation amount between less than 200 mm in the north of Nigeria and1000 mm in the north of Mali. The climate is sub-humid and located approximatelybetween 9° N and 12.5° N. (c) The tropical humid Guinea Cost zone located alongthe Gulf of Guinea, characterized by annual mean rainfall higher than 1500 mm.

Fig. 2.1 Annual precipitation based on the gridded dataset of the global precipitation climatologycenter—version 2015 (Becker et al. 2013; Meyer-Christoffer et al. 2015)

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Rainfall in this zone varies according to the orientation of the coastline and inlandmountains with coastlines perpendicular to the SW monsoon. These coast showvery high precipitation amounts, contrary to, for example the Ghana-Togo dry zone(Fink et al. 2016). The Guinea Cost and the Sudanian zone both have a bi-modalrainfall distribution (Fig. 2.2) (UNEP 2006).

Rainfall in the tropics is mostly convective and therefore rather unevenly dis-tributed over time and space. Convective events can occur at any time in the year,but are more likely in the rainy season. A characteristic feature in Western Africa isthat the isolated convective showers organize into large thunderstorm complexes.For details on West African rainfall types see Fink et al. (2010b). The seasonalpatterns of rainfall and temperature in Western Africa are influenced by two airmasses: the dry and usually hot Harmattan north-easterly winds originating fromthe Sahara, and the low-level monsoonal south westerly winds originating from the

Fig. 2.2 Average annual precipitation over West Africa based on the gridded dataset of the globalprecipitation climatology center (version 2015; Meyer-Christoffer et al. 2015). There is a strongpattern in seasonality (upper left) dry season, DJF, end of dry season, beginning of rainy seasonfrom the south to the north MAM (upper right panel), rainy season JJA (lower left panel), end ofrainy season SON (lower right panel)

2 What’s on the 5th IPCC Report for West Africa? 11

Atlantic Ocean. The movement of the air masses is associated with northwards andsouthwards pulsations of a narrow confluence zone of discontinuity (“IntertropicalDiscontinuity” (Fink et al. 2016)) between the dry Harmattan and the tropicalmaritime monsoon to the south.

Annual temperatures in these zones are in the range of 26–30 °C, but distinctdifferences exist in the overnight temperatures and near-surface humidity in winter:night-time temperatures regularly fall below 10 °C in the Sahel. On the Guineacoast, minimum temperatures typically do not fall below 18 °C. Relative humiditystays below 50 % throughout the day in the Sahel, whereas values are highthroughout the year on the Guinea coast (Fink et al. 2016).

Box 2. Climate Scenarios (Representative Concentration PathwayScenarios (RCP))Climate projections for the period until 2100 are performed with global cli-mate models. Applying the models for that time frame requires assumptionsabout the atmospheric composition, i.e., the concentration of atmosphericgreenhouse gases. The development of future atmospheric compositiondepends on the emissions of these gases from anthropogenic and naturalsources. Anthropogenic emissions are driven by economic and technologicaldevelopment as well as political decisions, especially related to usage of fossilfuels and land use. In order to make climate model runs of different groupscomparable, they have to be based on the same assumptions on futureemissions or concentration. Assumptions about future development are typ-ically aggregated in ‘scenarios’. The assumptions can vary greatly, but shouldbe internally consistent within one scenario. For the climate model runs in the5th Assessment Report, the scenarios are called ‘RepresentativeConcentration Pathways’ (RCPs). These scenarios prescribe the temporaldevelopment of emissions and concentrations of the full suite of greenhousegases, aerosols and chemically active gases, as well as land use/land cover.Four main scenarios have been defined with different targets of radiativeforcing in the year 2100: RCP 8.5, RCP 6.0, RCP 4.5, RCP 2.6. The numbersrefer to the radiative forcing in W/m2 in 2100. Differences in the radiativeforcing between these scenarios are relatively small up to 2030, but becomevery large by the end of the 21st century and dominated by CO2 forcing. RCP8.5 is a high pathway which reaches >8.5 W/m2 by 2100 and continues to risefor some time after 2100; RCP 6.0 and RCP 4.5 are so-called “stabilizationpathways” in which the forcing is stabilized at approximately 6 and 4.5 W/m2

shortly after 2100. In RCP 2.6 the radiative forcing peaks at approximately3 W/m2 before 2100 and then declines to approx. 2.6 W/m2 in 2100. In orderto reach such a forcing, greenhouse gas emissions have to be reduced sub-stantially over time.

The scenarios are used to run global climate models for the 21st century.Such models are developed and operated by several modeling centers. Takentogether, the ensemble of results for each RCP scenario allows for assessing

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the uncertainty that arises from the use of different models. To provide aframework for systematic comparison the centers agree on so-called “ModelIntercomparison Projects (MIPs)”. Many results of the AR5 are based on the5th Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP51). The typical resolutionof the atmospheric component of global climate models in the AR5 is in theorder of 1°–2°. Regional Climate Models (RCMs) are used to simulateregional climate at higher spatial resolution. Lateral boundary conditions aretaken from global climate simulations. Again, several centers contribute with

Fig. 2.3 Change in average surface temperature based on a multi-model mean projectionsfor 2081–2100 relative to 1986–2005 under the RCP2.6 (left) and RCP8.5 (right) scenarios.Thin lines denote one ensemble member per model, thick lines the CMIP5 multi-modelmean. On the right-hand side the 5th, 25th, 50th (median), 75th and 95th percentiles of thedistribution of 20-year mean changes are given for 2081–2100 in the four RCP scenarios

Fig. 2.4 Explanation of the features of a typical time series figure presented in the IPCCAR5. (IPCC AR5 Figure AL.1)

1The Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP) provides infrastructure in support ofclimate model diagnostics validation, intercomparison documentation and data access.

2 What’s on the 5th IPCC Report for West Africa? 13